Out of My Head
by flyingcrowbar
Summary: A Kaiju attack destroys the IronJaeger. Jarvis is hurt - bad - and so am I, but I don't have time to think about any of it because he's still in my head and I am losing him bit by bit.


"Blood pressure down, heart failing. He's gone into v-fib! Prep for ACLS, stat!"

They've got Jarvis and he's not moving and he's in trouble.

I don't remember coming here, I don't even remember leaving the cockpit. All I know is Jarvis, and Knifehead, and blood. The color was on my screen, the floor, my hands, my mouth. I smell it, see it, hear it and it's one big mess. At first I didn't know it, I couldn't understand it, it wasn't real. It couldn't be.

All around me the voices are jumbled together into one sound and I'm shouting, and I think I fall, and a hand grabs me and I was - am I hurt? What happened? Where is he? What happened to him?

Pepper (oh God, Pepper) puts a towel to my face and wipes away blood that sprouted from my nose. I see she's crying, I think I'm crying? I'm not sure what I am. They said we shouldn't pilot alone, but I had no other goddamn choice! He was just there and I was watching him, and I saw through his eyes, and I knew - _I just knew_. I have to puke, I have to puke now.

They give me oxygen and press me deeper into the gurney, though I fight back. I have to see him, I have to get to him, he can't be without me. Or is it the other way around?

The shakes haven't stopped, and I can barely breathe. All I can do is watch as my best friend lays there, red stained and sallow, his head lolls listlessly with the frenetic crowd struggling to keep him alive. Is he even alive?! Is he alive?!

His memories echo in my head, leftover from the disconnected drift, repeating like a skipping disc. My brain is a drudge of memories, mine and his, trying to find their way home. The drugs are making it hard for me to focus, and the room shifts.

Something pricks my arm and a warm, fake calm flows in my veins and the broken bits of the drift float through my head and I'm not me anymore.

I saw myself as if I was Jarvis and he watched as I schmoozed the late night talk show host - hey, I remember this. I was drunk out of my head, but I remember. The audience didn't seem to notice because they were laughing and I was talking and smiling and joking. I was always so much more extroverted than he was. Jarvis liked to sit stock still in the chairs, hands gripped tight on the armrests, knuckles as pale as his hair. He never liked the spotlight, it only made the ladies love him more for it.

Another drift. Jarvis got his first fan mail and I saw the cards through him. I felt his confusion, his apprehension, his pink-cheeked innocence. Nudie pictures peeked out from behind perfume scented favors, special treats hidden within even sweeter surprises. He didn't know what to do with them. He saw me hanging up the picture of the busty blonde bombshell (before it got serious with Pepper, of course) in our barracks earlier and he thought maybe he couldn't ever be like me.

The pain rouses me enough from the memory to let a scream escape my throat, all guttural and gross like a goddamn Kaiju, and I am being torn apart - at least I feel like it - and they reach inside me and pull out my arc reactor and I can smell the stink of it and it's fried, and I hear voices trying to soothe me, repeating over and over, "We got it out. It's out. It's fine. It's alright, Tony."

The fluorescent lights above me blur and I know I'm crying for sure. I am man enough to admit that at least. Am I in the med bay? It smells like the med bay. I _hate_ the med bay. Where's Jarvis? Where is he? I capture a glimpse of red - more blood? Oh God! - but it's Pepper, her cinnamon head is bowed over me. She's whispering something in my ear, and I can't hear anything because I'm lost again.

"Sir?" He always liked to call me that, even after I told him not to (though I secretly liked it). We were in this together. It was our first neural handshake when he said it, and even though there was no rank in the drift, Jarvis didn't think so. He looked over at me, from his bipedal pod, with a hint of a smile and kind blue eyes. He called me "sir" not for me but for him. It was his way of showing how much he cared, how much he respected, how much he honored. Already, I liked him. We would become inseparable for two years.

In the memory, I could feel his heart racing but his mind stayed a steady level of focus. IronJaeger, my design, united us as one, made us whole. He had always been the one to ground me and I pushed him to his limits. If I concentrated hard enough on it, I could almost hear the calm hum that resonated within his thoughts. Of course, it was only a figment of the drift, but it was a kind reminder that he was always there.

"Where is he?" I manage to growl, choking on my own words. I can taste the iron in the back of my throat. "Is he okay?" I ask, not to anyone in particular, because no one is listening to me over the din of orders from the medics and I can't tell if I'm actually saying the words out loud or not. A hand on my shoulder, a needle in my arm, a bite of pain, and I'm quiet.

Then I wake up and I'm standing in a field. No sound, no wind, nothing but the tall grass tickling my ankles, the warm sun and the gentle lull of the countryside. Trees surround the field in a wide circle, and I catch the salt in the still air telling me I'm near the ocean. I have no memory of this place, so it must be his.

Am I dying? Am I already dead? Did I chase the rabbit and get trapped in one of Jarvis's leftovers? Are the drugs taking their toll? I don't feel anything anymore. I'm so numb and flaccid and mute and I'm struggling to bring myself out of the fog in my head to realize that everything isn't okay. I'm not alright. I'm in trouble, Jarvis. Where are you? I need you.

And then I see him, but he doesn't see me. His back is to me, head lowered, looking at something at his feet. I shuffle forward, bare feet dragging on unfeeling earth as I push on. I am a ghost to this world, a spirit of the land and nothing more. Nothing. _Nothing_.

I want to call out to him but he can't hear me anyway but I keep going because I want to see him. And I finally make it to stand right next to him and he doesn't even acknowledge me. So I'm there and I wait and I wait. And I'm still waiting. I don't know what for, but I am.

Jarvis stands, shoulders straight as a soldier should, fists clenched at his sides and jaw just as set. His eyes trace over a plaque embedded in the ground. My eyes follow his and read the text:

"The worst part of holding the memories is not the pain. It's the loneliness of it. Memories need to be shared."

- _The Giver_, Lois Lowry

Beneath it is a list of dozens of names. I slowly piece it together. This is the site of the first battle - kaiju against jaeger, monster versus man, ancient evil fighting modern heroes. There are too many names on the memorial, all of them are too many.

Then Jarvis speaks. At first, I think he's speaking to himself but with a startling revelation, I realize he's definitely not.

"I'm glad you followed me here, sir," Jarvis says.

"Uh, well, Jarvis, you know me. I'm not a first date you can ditch."

"Indeed, sir," Jarvis says.

I can't believe it. I'm talking to a memory, and he's responding. The drugs are making me hallucinate for sure.

"You're not hallucinating," he says, reading my mind. Are we still connected somehow? But that's impossible… And he turns his icy gaze to me and looks _right at me_. Not through me, but straight on - as if I were here the whole time.

I stare him down because I'm so relieved to see him as he was, strong and healthy and happy (if Jarvis could ever show it) and so very alive. I want to tell him that, but he's speaking again.

"I knew you would find this memory at a time you might need it most, so I saved it in your subconscious. Predicting what you will say is fairly logical. If you're seeing this now, I remembered it specifically for you."

"Why?" It was the only question I could ask that made sense.

"This is my gift to you. A way of saying goodbye, if you will, sir."

My heart plummets into the vast ocean that is my stomach and sinks like a boulder. I can feel my eyes sting, but I blink back the oncoming wave. "C'mon, buddy. You can't give up on me like that. What am I going to do without you?"

Jarvis smiles knowingly and his gaze drops. He's clearly amused by my stubbornness, and then I remember that this is what he thinks I would say all along and he's known me too well, better than anyone.

"Then what would you like me to do, sir?" he asked.

"Fight. Live. That kaiju got us once, but we're going to get back up and keep going. That's what we've always done."

"I appreciate your tenacity."

"Damn straight!" I feel like I'm getting to him, as stupid as it may sound - talking to nothing but a memory. But it makes me feel better. "You're bruised and beaten and -" I choke because I remember and desperately try not to, so instead I recover "- but you're my partner. I'm not in the business of hiring new help. Too much trouble."

"Of course not, sir."

I gulp and realize that my throat is so dry and coarse and rough and I just want to tell him how much I miss him but I can't because he already knows. So I change the subject. "Why did you bring me here?"

Jarvis sighs deeply, taking in the air that he can appreciate far more than I, and looks at the blinding and cloudless blue sky. "This place is where it all started, for so many reasons. You, more than anyone, knows why."

I did. It didn't need to be said.

"After this day, I was made again. You gave me a new start. You helped me rebuild. I just want to tell you how thankful I am that you gave me my life back."

"Don't talk like you're already dead," I think I say but I'm too busy focusing on not screaming. "You're going to make it out of this."

"As you wish, sir."

"That's an order," I bark.

The corners of his mouth turn upward. The secrets behind that smile have been revealed to me so many times, but he still somehow finds a way to surprise me and make me remember how special he is for all of us.

"I'm going to find you, and stay by your side, through all of it. If I'm not there, I've been dead long before you. And I'm not giving up until that happens, do you understand?"

I feel the fire growing in my chest. It burns with such ferocity, it's like a sun has erupted - reviving me, giving me new energy. It jolts me out of my stupor. I'm real, I'm still me.

"Clear," goes Jarvis's mouth, but it's not his voice.

And I am screaming and sitting up and I'm soaked in sweat and blood and tears and my heart is pounding and my chest is filled to burst and the doctors and nurses are standing around me, one of them brandishing a pair of shock paddles with wide-eyed surprise, and I'm alive. I'm fucking alive.

"Where is Jarvis?!" Those are the first words out of my mouth.

And I don't even notice the shiny new arc reactor in my chest or the unfastened hospital gown or the unattached IV dangling from my arm because I'm on my feet and running down the hallway, ignoring the protests from the staff because I need to find him. I need to be near him. I can't break my promise, not now, not ever.

And I bolt by a door but backpedal as soon as I see that mess of white hair and there he is, laying alone in the room, his bed propped up giving me a full view of him. And I suppress a cry because he's alive, the monitor tells me so. But the tubes and drips tell me he's not out of trouble yet.

So I go to him and I see his chest rising and falling, his mouth propped open by the tube giving him life, and his wounds have been cleaned and he's all wrapped up so I don't know where his waxen skin starts and where the bandages end. The slow but steady beep of his heart spikes my heart into my throat.

"I'm here, buddy. I'm right here," I croak, because that's all I can muster. And I pull up a chair from the corner and sit, and I wait, and I wait. And I'm still waiting. But this time I know what I'm waiting for.

No one bothers us.

It's been hours, maybe days. I don't know so don't ask me. The adrenaline has subsided and replaced itself with pure exhaustion by now. And I want to stay awake, I want to be ever watchful, but it's so hard because my eyes are heavy. And I only know that sleep is coming soon, but I want to be here when he wakes.

I lean forward and put my hand on his motionless shin, feeling the sturdiness of the bone under the cotton sheet, and I grip it assuredly because I want him to know I'm always here.

But of course he knows. Of course he does.

So I put my head on his leg, and my eyes are like lead weights and they slowly start to drop. I swear I can hear the birds chirping with the rising sun but it's so early and yet so late.

And it's dark now, behind my closed lids, and I feel my body relax.

Then just before I drift off to sleep, I swear I can hear a voice that puts me at peace.

"Good morning, sir."

* * *

A/N: My entry for the Kaijubuster Contest blog over at .com.


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